Dynamic studies of poly(di-n-alkyl itaconate)s

We report a preliminary dynamic study of poly(din-alkyl itaconate)s with varying side chain length n. QENS measurements were carried out on two backscattering spectrometers, IRIS at ISIS and IN10 at the ILL in the temperature range of 4 to 350 K. We show that molecular motion can be detected well below the polymer glass transition for all samples. It is possible to distinguish different dynamic processes. The temperature range over which these are observed is dependent on the length of the side chain, n. The intermediate scattering function, I(Q, t), was determined from the IRIS and found to obey time-temperature superposition. We show that the I(Q, t) data at different temperatures can be overlapped using the same time-scale shift factors, indicating that the relaxation process is common to all the polymers investigated.